


I'm Here

by Grimmy88



Category: Left 4 Dead (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-23 02:01:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30048231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grimmy88/pseuds/Grimmy88
Summary: Written for the Left 4 Dead Zine, check it out here:https://twitter.com/left4deadzine/status/1371219262514229251An introspective on Zoey that details her dealing with the aftermath of Bill's death. She steps up as her group's new leader and makes the decision to help the four survivors that need them. Even with their vantage point, it's easier said than done with grief still so very near for her and her friends.
Kudos: 3





	I'm Here

“This ain’t workin’!” Francis snarled.

There was a loud clatter in the space of the balcony between him and Zoey. When she glanced over, she saw that it had been made by his discarded, empty shotgun. In his frustration he must have found it useless even when it had been loaded. This wasn’t surprising considering how accurate they now needed to be.

The biker felt more confident when he was blasting away freely. He took pride in the way he could turn their attackers to globules of gore and tissue. Oftentimes he liked to stand and admire his ‘artwork’ once the chaos had passed.

He couldn’t do that now. Not with four survivors sprinting below them, dodging and weaving and fighting for their lives.

Truthfully, these people had had some shitty timing.

They’d come at exactly the moment the trio had been waiting for—right when the horde had finally dispersed enough for them to move Louis down to the boat. It had taken hours—some of the most painful hours of her life—before enough had cleared away. Hours where they’d had nothing to do but sit in silence and think about how they’d lost Bill. Their leader.

Their friend.

Surprisingly, Zoey had found herself calling the shots during that time, never mind that there were still two people in their group at least ten years her senior. They had immediately looked to her. Listened to her.

The first call had been to respect Bill’s sacrifice. To stay alive and make it back to that boat. To worry about nothing else but their safety and freedom. The second had been to move the boat to the opposite side of the bridge once the path had cleared enough. She and Francis had gone down together after securing Louis in a locked room in the bar.

She’d been hesitant to leave the office worker but had been shut down the moment she’d offered to go alone. She’d been secretly grateful for that and with Francis’ cover it had been easy to move the _One 4 All_ into position.

After that had come the waiting game. She and the biker had been on constant patrol to assess the dispersing size of the horde. It had been during her turn that her ears had caught the loud, burring engine of a car. Then she’d heard the voices.

_We look after our own_ , Bill had said.

Zoey had repeated it…had believed it the moment he’d given his life for it.

And yet the moment those people had called out she’d answered.

Louis had stood by her decision, though definitely not in the literal sense. She’d barely had to explain before he was determining the most strategically secure way to help. Even so, he’d been the first to decline the new team’s offer of joining them. He’d been pretty polite about it, which contrasted with the colorful word choice Francis had used to explain why they were done with the military.

His sour mood was stoked even further by his immediate problem with the other group’s attitude—or at least the Suit’s. From what Zoey could tell, though, their brands of bitchiness were probably complimentary. Not that she’d been about to waste her breath expressing that.

It had been the smart play, considering he’d still been willing to help even after their little hissy fit. But, maybe that had more to do with the way his eyes had strayed to Rochelle a little too often for him to truly engage in the verbal sparring slung his way.

She’d been glad to have something new to tease him about after they made it through this.

Judging by his current exasperation, though, those jokes would have to wait.

“Can’t do anything if I ain’t up close!” Francis complained.

Zoey didn’t respond. She was on one knee, perched and peering through her rifle’s scope, waiting for the other survivors to come back into view. She’d heard plenty of screaming, both regular infected and worse, and she needed to be ready to deal with it the moment she could make a shot. Louis could mow down the crowds and Tanks with his giant machine gun. Francis could cover the off angles now that he’d switched to one of their sidelined M16’s.

That meant Zoey had to be the crack shot. She had to land every single hit on any specials that crossed her path. She had to be _there_ and focused. She was the difference between life and death for these people, and she was going to keep them alive. All four of them.

“It’s easy to run out of ammo with that gun!” Louis warned as he reloaded. “And be careful with your aim!”

“Yeah, yeah!” Francis groused. “Don’t shoot Colonel Sanders, I got it. … Stupid white suit’s a walkin’ target, though. Guy probably already got nabbed. You hear all that? We’re useless up here.”

“Nah, they’re fine!” their ever-optimistic friend assured. “And they’re gonna stay that way!”

He was right for the moment. Zoey caught sight of them directly across from her group’s position. They were hurrying down the alley between the warehouses, beelining for the generator. Their two larger members were carrying a gas can in either hand. It was clear the weight was taking its toll on their shoulders. And even though they had their remaining teammates to cover their backs, the task was also a toll on their safety.

They had to do this collection again and again. Each time they dumped their quarry at the base of the generator without filling it so that they could cover as much ground as possible before the area was overrun with infected. Still, attracted to sound as they were, it was inevitable that the zombies closest would come to investigate the running footsteps. Eventually, the foursome had created enough of a racket to have cajoled out a steady stream of them.

They were easy to keep at bay, but Zoey couldn’t help but feel anxious when she heard certain identifying screams whenever the quartet was out of her sight and range.

What mattered, she told herself—repeated it as a mantra—was that when she could help, she did. To shoot down Smokers before their tongues could land, Jockeys before their feet left the ground, and Hunters before they could even catch a whiff of their targets. She managed at least one of those before the real problems came. Interested by their volley of combined gunfire, all the zombified residents of the city were steadily coming right back to the bridge they’d vacated not too long ago.

_Shitty timing_ , she thought again.

It was harder to shoot after that. The commotion around them made everything a blur that was only exacerbated by all the screeching, mutated voices. She could feel the headache forming behind her eyes and the anxiety coagulating in her heart. She tried to breathe them both away on her exhales, but every deep breath readjusted her aim and made her all the slower.

She was good enough to get the Spitter the moment she caught a glimpse of it in her peripheral. She was able to stop the Smoker from dragging the youngest of the new survivors too far. Managed a late, but timely shot to keep Rochelle’s ribs underneath her skin where they belonged.

But she couldn’t keep the Charger from snatching up their leader and crashing him into the nearest brick wall. The cries of his friends hit her ears as hard as the crack of the impact. It took her three shots to get the monster off the man… because with her shaking hands she’d missed the first.

When the corpse fell to the wayside, she thanked her luck that the big man was still moving.

His teammates rushed to him, but the Suit was the only one capable of managing his weight once they got him back on his feet.

So, of course, that was when the ground began shaking.

“You were sayin’, Louis?!” Francis wondered.

“You gotta move faster!” Zoey screamed at the group. “The Tanks are coming!”

“Tanks?” a southern accent demanded. “More than one?!”

And not a second after the question had been asked did one of the nearby cars provide an answer. It flipped by him, side after side, some scant feet away from clipping his back. The two older men had to dive backwards to keep from being crushed. Effectively it cut their team in half, forcing the wounded pair to back up towards the warehouses with one Tank lumbering in pursuit.

The younger pair couldn’t attempt to help, either, because the second one was closing in on their position, pushing them the opposite way.

“I’m taking the first one!” Louis called before his voice was lost under the roar of his machine gun.

That left Ellis and Rochelle to her and Francis. They gave chase after them along the length of the balcony, though at the end of it they had to squeeze in together to aim around the outside corner of the bar. The moment they got situated was also the moment one enormous fist connected with a yellow-clad back.

Ellis was lucky that he didn’t launch into anything too punishing. Because he fell forward, he was able to roll out the momentum when he landed. He’d be fine.

But still Zoey felt the anxiety once again overtaking her, soaking every crevice of her chest. When she looked up at Francis, she knew he felt it, too. She knew by the roundness of his eyes and how white the grip of his knuckles exactly what memory had flashed through his mind.

She could feel it in their shared tremble.

But that Tank was plunging its hands into the ground and ripping up a slab of street. And its target’s feet were struggling for purchase.

“Francis!” She dropped to her knee and fired again and again, grateful that she’d upgraded to the semi-automatic when the concrete broke apart to land upon the monster’s head.

It stunned the giant long enough for her friend to remember himself and add his bullets to the mix.

The Tank stumbled a bit and then spun on them, enraged by the damage they were pelting on it from above. It couldn’t reach them like it could the other survivors, so it tried its throwing trick again.

Francis hauled her back and away, though the siding of the bar took the brunt of the damage for them. Lucky for them, the makeshift balcony also held out, so they were able to bend right back around to pump some more lead into the massive body. Combined with what the other carriers were dispensing, it wasn’t long before the Tank fell.

Rochelle thanked them, but Ellis rushed as fast as his bruised body could back to where they’d last seen their friends.

“Nick!” he yelled. “Coach!”

“We’re alright,” the Suit assured, lugging the tall man around the pile of mangled muscle left in the machine gun’s wake.

“Woo, Louis!” Ellis crowed. “You are the _man_!”

And while the other survivors took advantage of the moment to finish filling the generator and check one another over, Zoey turned to her friend to do the same.

“Francis.”

“I’m here,” he affirmed, already knowing. He said it with a pained, wistful smile all the same.

“Good,” she said, returning it.

“Where’s the third one?” Louis demanded, drawing everyone’s attention. His eyes were round and there was something feral in them. “I’m gonna shred that one apart, too!”

Yes, there _had_ been three… and Zoey almost wished she could trade places with the office worker just to know the feeling of killing the last of the creatures that had taken Bill from them.

But she would have to be blind not to see the tormented expression flickering over her teammate’s face.

So, she reloaded her rifle.

“Fire up that genny,” she called down to the four below, “and let’s find out.”


End file.
